I have recently stumbled across an article from 1911, about a French scientific investigator who was allegedly able to imprint images of the things he was thinking of, onto photographic plates. The article was published by The New Your Times newspaper.
PHOTOGRAPHS OF THOUGHTS; French Scientist Declares He Has Succeeded in Taking Them.
PARIS, Aug. 15. (1911) — “Much interest has been aroused here by the announcement of the well-known scientific investigator, Commander Darget, of the success of experiments in photographing human thought.
Commander Darget, who had devoted a long time to the study of hypnotism and kindred subjects, stated yesterday to the Academy of Sciences that after many trials he had succeed in obtaining photographic impressions of thoughts of concrete objects. He produced as evidence two photographs, one showing a walking stick and the other a bottle, in each case the image being perfectly distinct.
In explanation of his achievement, Commander Darget gave the following account of the process:
After staring a long time on the object to be photographed in a strong red light, concentrating all his attention on it, he fixed his gaze with all the will power at his command on a photographic plate that had previously been immersed in a weak developer in a dark room. At the end of a quarter of an hour the image of the object appeared on the negative.
According to the Commander’s theory, these astounding results are due to certain obscure light rays which he calls “V” rays.
As the Academy of Science is the highest official body of savants in France, all Commander Darget’s experiments were made in the presence of six witnesses, there seems no doubt as to their authenticity.”
Source: The New York Times. A picture of the article, in .pdf format, is also available for download.
